Greetings Fellow Dice Fans!

For this week’s confusing card of the week article, we’re going to take a look at Batcave: Home Sweet Cave from the DC World’s Finest set.

Ruling – Ability

Batcave is a Continuous, Non-Basic Action. If a card ability would affect an Action Die and does not specify Basic Action Die, Batcave could be chosen for the effect. One such example is Constantine: Antihero.

Continuous is a keyword found on Action cards. When you use the action die, it is placed in the Field Zone and will remain in the Field Zone until the ability is activated or triggered. Activating or triggering the ability is not considered ‘using’ the die. Using the die is when you move it from your Reserve Pool into the Field Zone. It can remain in the Field Zone after your turn.

Batcave’s ability says that when one of of your character dice is KO’d, you can place it under your Batcave die instead. This is optional, which means if you forget to place a KO’d character die under Batcave and realize it later in the turn, you can’t back up to place it under Batcave. If a character ability would put the character die somewhere other than your Prep Area, you may still place that die under Batcave. When KO’d abilities on character dice would still happen but if there is a timing conflict, the active player’s abilities would happen first. If the active player controls both abilities, that player chooses the order in which they happen.

During your Main Step, you can move your Batcave die to your Used Pile and take all of your character dice that were under it and return them to the Field Zone. Those dice return to the Field Zone at level one, and they are not considered to be fielded for When Fielded effects. You can only activate Batcave on your turn. You can have multiple Batcave dice active and you can choose which die to place your KO’d character under. You can also activate as many Batcave dice as you have during your Main Step.

If a card ability would remove your Batcave die (sending it Out of Play, to the Used Pile, etc), then your character dice that were under Batcave would go to your Used Pile.

Miscellaneous Card Information

~ Batcave: Home Sweet Cave is a Shield Action.
~ It does not have an affiliation.
~ It has a max dice of four.
~ This card is a Common and is #37 of 142.

Examples

These examples are for information purposes only, to show what would happen in certain scenarios. I am not suggesting that these examples are the best outcomes for each scenario and each example only features relevant parts of the turn, not the entire turn.

Example One:
Characters KO’d during the Main Step and the Attack Step.

~ I have two Sidekick dice and one level two Zatanna: Actual Magician die in the Field Zone. I also have a Batcave active in the Field Zone and three Wild energy in my Reserve Pool. My opponent has two Sidekick dice in the Field Zone.
~ (Main Step) I spend one Wild energy as a Bolt (moving it Out of Play) and KO my Zatanna die to use Blue-Eyes White Dragon‘s Global. I choose to put Zatanna in the Prep Area and not under Batcave.
~ (Main Step) I spend one Wild as a Mask (moving it Out of Play) to purchase another Zatanna die, placing it in the Used Pile. Blue-Eyes Global allowed me to purchase the die for two less.
~ (Main Step) I pass priority to my opponent and they don’t use any Globals.
~ (Attack Step – Assign Attackers) I assign my two Sidekick dice to attack, moving them into the Attack Zone.
~ (Attack Step – Assign Blockers) My opponent assigns each of their Sidekick dice to block mine, moving them into the Attack Zone and placing each one in front of mine.
~ (Attack Step – Assign and Resolve Damage) Each Sidekick has one attack and one defense. All Sidekicks will deal one damage and KO each other. I choose to place both of my Sidekick dice under Batcave instead of the Prep Area.
~ (Clean Up Step) All character dice that were KO’d by damage from blocking or by being blocked are now sent to their respective Prep Area, unless otherwise stated. My two Sidekicks will go under my Batcave. All effects clear from active dice (unless otherwise stated). All dice that are Out of Play are moved to the Used Pile.

Example Two:
Activating Batcave.

~ I have a Batcave die in the Field Zone with three Sidekick dice and three Guy Gardner dice under it. It’s currently my Main Step.
~ (Main Step) I choose to activate Batcave. I move my Batcave die directly to the Used Pile, and then all the character dice that were under it are returned to the Field Zone at level one.
~ (Main Step) I now have three level one Guy Gardner dice and three Sidekick dice in my Field Zone.

Official Sources

Unlimited Competitive Play Rating

I can’t think of a team that this would be good for in the current Unlimited meta. With Antihero being such a widely used piece in the meta, I can’t see this card being used much – if at all. The card isn’t bad but it’s not good to use something like Batcave when there is a counter for it being played on numerous teams.

Batcave: Home Sweet Cave gets a rating of zero out of five stars.

Prime Play Rating

From the matches I’ve played in the prime format, I could see someone being able to pull off some fun things with this card. I don’t see it making a top tier list, but I could see it squeaking into the rogue tier somewhere. We don’t have major threats like Antihero to worry about in prime, unless I missed them. If you find some, don’t be shy – leave your findings and ideas in the comments! But even in the slower prime format, I don’t know if this card has a place in the meta. I’m sure someone can find a creative way to build around this card and surprise us all.

Batcave: Home Sweet Cave gets a Prime rating of two out of five stars.

Casual Play Rating

I have played this card a bunch of times in a casual setting, and it’s actually really fun. A team with the Batcave and Guy Gardner is effective and fun to play. But the use of the card and die leaves many folks confused, especially when they don’t know what to do with characters when their Batcave gets removed by another effect. It left me stumped for a while too, until they posted the official ruling. A beginner may have trouble with this card until they have a better understanding of the game, but a more advanced player may find it useful. I have shown this card to newer players and explained how it works. They seemed to understand it well enough and some have even picked it up and played with it. They had additional questions, but with a little explanation, they were able to figure out some strategy and uses for it on their own. I can recommend this card for advanced casual players, and some beginners that have backgrounds in other games.

Batcave: Home Sweet Cave gets a casual play rating of three out of five stars.

Opinions on this card? Leave a comment! Is there a card your confused on? Is there a combo that seems too good to be true? Leave me a comment here or message me on Facebook at Dice Dice Kitty and thanks for reading!